25/1/2002
Following September 11, Annan Calls on Disarmament Conference to Make Progress

As the Conference on Disarmament opened its 2002 session this week in Geneva, United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan stressed that the events of 11 September and their aftermath had brought home to the world that effective disarmament measures were urgently needed to eliminate the risk of weapons of mass destruction falling into the hands of terrorists. He said that the threat of terrorism called for a complete break in the recent prolonged inactivity of the forum.

The Conference on Disarmament is the single multilateral negotiating venue for disarmament agreements. In the past it has been bedevilled by a succession of stalemated positions, unable even to agree on a negotiating agenda.

"I strongly believe that the representative membership of this Conference gives it the intellectual and political potential to overcome the current stalemate, and I trust you will use that potential to its fullest extent," Mr. Annan wrote in a message delivered on his behalf by Vladimir Petrovsky, Director-General of the UN Office in Geneva.

Among the challenges facing the Conference, Mr. Annan pointed to the abrupt end last year of negotiations on a protocol to strengthen the Biological Weapons Convention and the slow progress in achieving the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

Despite such stagnation, the Secretary-General highlighted some positive developments, including the substantial reduction in nuclear weapons announced by the United States and the action plan adopted by the Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects, which had provided a blueprint for international and regional co-operation.